Kalahandi gets medical college after 20 years, NMC gives permission for 100 MBBS Seats

Bhubaneswar: Bringing good news to the medical aspirants in Odisha, the National Medical Commission (NMC) has given its permission for 100 MBBS seats at the government medical college in the Kalahandi district of the State.

With the NMC nod in this regard, the medical college will start admitting students from the current academic year. Sharing the news, the Office of the Collector and District Magistrate, Kalahandi Tweeted, "National Medical Commission has approved opening of Govt Medical College at Bhawanipatna, Kalahandi with 100 MBBS seats from the academic session 2023-24."

Medical Dialogues had earlier reported that Health and Family Welfare secretary Shalini Pandit had confirmed that four new medical colleges will be set up by the Odisha government in Kalahandi, Talcher, Jajpur, and Kandhamal.

Among these, the Government Medical College and Hospital, Kalahandin has been constituted at an investment of more than 200 crore rupees. In this regard, the Central Government has sanctioned 60% of the total amount. On the other hand, the state is bearing the entire cost of recurring infrastructure.

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Sources informed Odisha TV that the construction work of the academic and administrative blocks, hostels, and staff quarters for the 100-seat medical college is almost complete and the construction work of the academic building is ongoing and it is expected to be completed soon.

The college has been set up on the outskirts of Bhawanipatna and it has been built on 36 acres of land. The Daily adds that the beautification work of the medical college and hospital is also almost complete.

Earlier, an experiment had been conducted to run a medical college in Kalahandi district by a private party on the government land. While the college had admitted students for two batches in 2013 and 2014, the venture had failed.

As per the latest media report by the Times of India, the State first tried to set up a medical college in Kalahandi district around 20 years ago back in 2004. Back then, the Western Odisha Development Council (WODC) had invited proposals from the private parties in Kalahandi, Balangir, Rourkela and Sundargarh districts. At that time, the State had offered Rs 10 crore financial aid and 25 acres of land free of cost.

Even though a Tamil-Nadu-based trust started admitting MBBS students in 2013-2014 and the next academic year, WODC complained to police against the President of the trust for criminal breach of trust. In the complaint, WODC had accused the Trust president of violating the memorandum of understanding signed with WODC and also for playing with the future of hundreds of medical students.

Consequently, The HC bench had ordered the Odisha government to transfer all 124 students of Kalahandi Medical College to two government and three private medical colleges in the state, the Medical Dialogues team reported back in 2015.

Now, with the NMC nod for GMC, Kalahandi, it has become the third medical college in the impoverished Kalahandi-Balangir-Koraput (KBK) region after the medical colleges in Koraput (2017) and Balangir (2018).

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